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Here you will find prayers and other liturgical writings. I'm an incorrigible borrow of others' writings, and started this archive to contribute a bit.
Things are posted in no particular order. Click "read more" at the bottom of each post for the full liturgy. Click on the "categories" in the sidebar (bottom of page in mobile) to see...you know, categories. I tried to include all the different ways people might want to search for liturgy: year of the revised common lectionary, book of the Bible, liturgical season, and element of worship. Feel free to use anything you find here, edit my words, or use them as a starting place for your own work. All my work on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons license that allows you to use and adapt my work with attribution for non-commercial purposes. Please credit me by name and link to this website.  This work by Alison Casella Brookins is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
BODY AFFIRMATION adapted by Rachel Miller Jacobs What’s the difference between an affirmation/confession of faith and a prayer? An affirmation or confession of faith is a statement we make in the presence of, but not specifically to, God and others as a way of concretely claiming something is true. A prayer is a spoken, silent, and/or physical “conversation” with God: it is addressed to God. I call this practice an affirmation because while we speak it in God’s presence, what we are saying is not specifically addressed to God. I am grounded extend arms wide overhead—orans posture my roots go deep bend from the waist and touch toes if possible! I am flexible raise arms above head and bend to the right I am resilient then bend to the left I am facing my past dropping arms to side, turn half-way around and am letting go turn the rest of the way to face the front; of what I don’t need to carry make a rolling motion with the hands, then a releasing motion I am honoring God from a bent position, straightening up with my body and soul while sweeping your hands up your body then extending back into original orans posture Adapted by Rachel Miller Jacobs from a STAR (Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience, Eastern Mennonite University http://www.emu.edu/cjp/star/) “prayer” A yearly blessing of the backpacks for teachers and students. People bring backpacks and shoulder bags or other symbols of their studies. Print off images on card stock, cut them apart, and make decks of cards tied together with string to give to each participant. The images represent each attribute we're praying for. As we name each attribute (curiosity, love, etc) we all find the matching card and put them in our backpacks. Scroll to the bottom to download the cards. Backpack blessing I
All ages Jesus our teacher, bless these backpacks. Fill them with your gifts that we can pull out whenever we have need. Fill them with curiosity, so that we can imagine the potential in every person and idea we come across. Fill them with love, so that our spirits are not quashed by stress or bustle but stay strong and centered. Fill them with kindness, so that in the crunch of competition we don’t try to win at someone else’s expense. Fill them with courage to take risks, to speak the truth, and to pursue justice in our schools. Fill them with grace that releases us from the burden of perfectionism, from the devastation of a bad grade, so that we can truly believe we are known and loved in both success and failure. Fill them with joy, buoyant, bubbling joy that fills in all the cracks and cannot be contained, so that we can burst out of ourselves and be fully present to our students, our teachers, our classmates, and the world. Jesus our teacher, bless our backpacks with these tools, and bless us with the wisdom to use them. Amen. A meal blessing for a celebration. I wrote this for a graduation party for a child from kindergarten to first grade, but it could be used or adapted for any meal celebrating a person: birthday, baptism, etc. Earthmaker and Lover of creation,
we know that this food before us has already been blessed by sun, earth, and rain. We are grateful for the hidden gifts of life in this food.* We pause for a moment to remember the sound of rain, the heat of sun, the hard work of many hands. This prayer/meditation/thing came to me one morning early in the COVID-19 pandemic, when I woke early Sunday morning feeling hopeless as the night leached into day. I did this first as a personal meditation, then immediately wrote it and led my congregation through it in Zoom worship.
Imagine that your belovedness is located deep inside of you. I’m talking about that core of who you are as someone made in the image of a God who loves you, that part of you that has experienced love and worth or that longs to feel that love. It’s there, whether you are familiar with it or not. Take a moment to locate it in your body. For me, it's a spot about the size of a walnut, right behind my sternum. Maybe it's larger or smaller for you, maybe it's lower in your gut, maybe it's higher in your heart, maybe it's somewhere else. Wherever the core of your belovedness is, reach down to it and give it a little nudge, waking it up. You can put your hand on your body if you like.  I wrote this while hiking ancient basalt riverbeds in northern Minnesota. Some really hard stuff was happening, and this just came to me.
God, Give me feet so I know I am on solid ground. Give me tears so I know I have compassion. Give me laughter so I know I am loved. Give me hands so I can hold on. Amen. Written January 27, 2019
Isaiah 25:6–8 "On the mountain, God will serve a feast" Matthew 11:28–30 "Come all who are weary" Revised Common Lectionary Year A One: Come, all who are thirsty. All: The hour has come One: Come, all who are weary and heavy-laden. All: The hour has come One: Come to the Lord's table, come to the mountain of the Lord, come to the party. All: The hour has come One: In this place, today, for us, the Lord has made a feast of fat things, a feast of well-aged wines. All: The hour has come One: A feast of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. All: The hour has come One: Come to the party, all who are thirsty, for I shall give you wine. Written Jan 20, 2019
Matthew 5, Beatitudes and turn the other cheek Martin Luther King Jr. Sunday Leader One: We come to worship a God who redefines strength... Leader Two: Blessed are the meek... One: ...a God who pushes the mountains flat and pulls the valleys level. Two: ...for they shall inherit the earth. One: We come to worship an unexpected, counterintuitive God... Two: Blessed are the peacemakers... One: ...a God who turns us away from our instinct to lash out, our longing for revenge. Two: ...for they will be called children of God. One: We come to worship a God who asks an awful lot of us... Two: If someone strikes you on the right cheek... One: ...but a God who does not leave us alone, who walks with us in a human body, who took the greatest of risks, and rose to joyous life. Two: ...offer them your other cheek also. One: So come. Two: Come to worship God. This is a set of Calls to Worship and Prayers for Advent. I wrote them in 2018 (RCL Year C), but aren't tied particularly to the lectionary. Rather they are tied to a theme of waiting in honest expectation for God to arrive, to make good on what God promised.
Written October2018
For a service of lament over the Doctrine of Discovery Menno Heritage Day materials Leader: Come. You are welcome here, as everywhere, in the faithful presence of God. Sit. Listen. Breathe. This presence is a gift. All: We breathe in the gift of joy. Leader: Bubbling, beautiful joy that bursts from our lips in song and laughter. Joy in this earth, for the blessed bustle of beings that make their homes here. All: We breathe in the gift of hope. |
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